Ranger Diary Blog

Good day and welcome to Kololo’s Ranger Diaries Blog, where the rangers of Kololo will share with you some of their best stories (Lions hunting, Elephants fighting), sightings (porcupine, aardvark) and interesting things that we have discovered on a regular basis…

For fun and adventure make sure you log on to Kololo’s Ranger Diaries on a regular basis. These are the Kololo rangers:

Paul Griffin

Prince Makgai

The rangers of Kololo are South Africans, therefore the ranger diaries will be published in English.

Family of the what? by Lomarie van Schalkwyk

When you look at a Dassie Hyrax (Procavia Capenis) you would think it is a rodent but it is actually family of the Elephant, so how can a small like rat looking animal be family of your big elephant?

Well in common with the elephant, hyraxes have no gall bladder; the lounges are attached to the rib cage. They have the same foot structures an elastic layer with thickened skin but the most interesting thing that they have in common with the Elephant is their incisors. Yes Dassies have tusks just like Elephants.

With both species you can’t see the scrotum either because they are up close to the kidney for protection and to keep nice and warm.

Here on Kololo we don’t have many Dassie we almost never see them, but at Leopards den one of the chalets I have seen two, a male and a female. They love to climb in the big Siring trees and eat the leaves, when you come closer they ran down one of the branches and jump on to a big rock and disappear into the thicket.

Dassie can have 1-4 babies and when they are born their eyes are open and they can run as fast as the adults.The mother will let them climb on her back and carry them around.

There are three species of Dassie that occur in southern Africa two of which is living in rocky habitats and the other one lives in the forested areas.

On kololo we only have one species the rock Dassie that I have seen here they might be called the rock Dassies but they will climb trees to get food and leaves.

They are truly an amazing animal and hopefully we will be seeing much more of them running around.

Porcupines by Richard Oosthuizen

Porcupines are the Largest African rodents and can have a body mass of up to 18 kg and an overall length of 80cm.

They are vegetarians and are capable of doing great damage to crops; they are fond of tree bark, roots and even bones.

Some questions we always have to answer: Can porcupines shoot their quills?

NO they can’t fire their quills. The quills are modified hair and cannot be fired or released when they feel like it. If you find a predator with a few quills sticking out of his body it is most likely the predator harassed the porcupine and got to close.

The next question is: How do porcupines mate?

My first answer will be ‘’very carefully’’ The female draw her tail sideways to expose her quill-free bottom surface to the male.

Crop farmers are not too happy when they find porcupines on their farm, but we at Kololo are always happy to take wild (problem Animals) away from farms and release them on kololo where they can live in peace.

New Born by Richard Oosthuizen

Every year we are privileged to be on Kololo when the new born arrive. From the middle of November to the end of February all the animals on Kololo give birth to tiny little baby’s. Matting season is in the middle of winter that means that the females are pregnant during the dry season. We provide the animals with salt, leak blocks and some Luzern grass for extra feed during the winter months to insure healthy females when they start giving birth.

The Zebra’s and the Blesbuck are first in the middle of November. The blesbuck babies are completely white and become darker when they become older, the little Zebra’s look the same as the mother except the brown hair covering the body but it disappears when they become alder. The Eland and waterbuck follows and then in December all the little Impala’s, Blue Wildebeest and Warthog appears.

But one of the most beautiful babies is the Kudu’s, The gestation period is +/- 210 days before a single baby is born, but you will only start seeing them in January because the females hide them away in the thickets till they big enough. This can be for up to four weeks before the young come out to join the herd.

A smile worth a million bucks

Those who are familiar with Welgevonden has ten to one heard or seen of a famous male lion called “Hanglip”. Now firstly the reason for this name is that quite some time ago this handsome young lion took his chances at catching a zebra, needless to say, he wasn’t very successful. Instead of catching the zebra, he managed to get his front teeth kicked out, his incisors bent and his lip is on a permanent droop (thus the name Hanglip) and I do believe his ego took quit some bruising too!

So our story starts with a normal afternoon drive in Welgevonden where we were treated with many beautiful sightings such as rhino and elephant. Nearing our last half hour of the game drive I located some very fresh male lion tracks and decided to follow them. After only a few minutes we managed to locate the owner of the tracks, and wouldn’t u believe it, it was Hanglip. He was lying very close to the car but amongst the rocks, he shortly got up and moved a few meters and started sniffing the ground at some lioness urine. Now when most male animals want to mate, they first do something called flehmen, that’s when they lick a females urine and press it against a special organ in the mouth that analysis it, in doing so they normally stand with a open mouth and a rather silly grin, so picture this deformed lion standing there with properly the worst smile ever only a few meters away from the vehicle! Myself and the guests could not help but to burst out in laughter at this sight. When the laughter died down to a giggle Hanglip gave us a quick glance (almost as if saying watch this) walked over to one of the bigger rocks, and wouldn’t you know it, a beautiful lioness came from behind it and all lovingly rubbed up against him. Shows you it’s not all about looks!

A Giant Sighting by Jasper Visser

A little while ago I did a full day game drive with the photo group of Rien wellman. We left very early because the photo group wanted to take picture of the sunrise in Welgevonden. We left the tented camp at 4 o’clock and of we went to the south gate of Welgevonden and my plan was to drive up low range pass, a beautiful viewing point with a view over the stunning southern plains of Welgevonden.

When we arrived at Lowrange pass it was only 10 minutes until sunrise. We had a beautiful beginning of the day and headed north where we encountered the western pride consisting of 9 lions. After that great sighting we stopped for coffee and breakfast and the temperature was rising fast so I decided to drive past one of the waterholes where I know the elephants and buffalo’s like to take a cooling down swim. And I was right, from a far distance we could hear the elephant trumpeting and when we arrived at Sterkstroom pan this is what we encountered… A breeding herd of 16 elephants playing in and around the waterhole and some of these giants totally disappearing under water from time to time…. Unbelievable.